Cheap & free date ideas

A genuine 1908 castle with free Italian, Japanese and rose gardens, peacocks, and a film resume that includes Professor X's mansion.

A deaf owned cafe on the West Bay Marina boardwalk, serving waffles, smoked salmon toast and an ocean view from 7am.

Two completely different waterscapes on one thin strip of sand, swans on one side, Olympics on the other, and it's free.

Chinatown tortilleria where heirloom corn gets nixtamalized overnight and pressed into tacos that embarrass every other taco in Victoria.

A Douglas-fir ravine behind UVic with a creek, footbridges and, if local legend holds, actual magic in the spring water.

Ross Bay Cemetery holds 20,000 stories, Emily Carr, a herd of resident deer, and the ocean glinting over the wall.

A 360-degree summit view ranked among Canada's most beautiful, and the whole trick is you drove here.

Free-roaming peacocks, ornamental ponds, stone bridges and a hilltop view of the Olympics, five minutes from downtown Victoria.

A flat tidal-inlet path lined with century-old umbrella pines, rose gardens, and the ghost of a 1907 floating tearoom.

A cliff-edge gravel loop in Esquimalt with wind-shaped firs, a sneaky gravel cove and the Olympic Mountains straight ahead.

Seventy-six acres of rare Garry oak meadow in Oak Bay, with unsigned paths, April camas and flat rocks at the water.

The two-lake, sandy-beach, Garry-oak-trail date fifteen minutes from downtown Victoria that somehow costs nothing except May-to-September parking.

Seven galleries, an 1889 mansion, twenty thousand works, and a Japanese garden with a real Shinto shrine waiting out back.

Victoria's most over-delivering sunset walk, from driftwood logs on the bluff to Clover Point's kite-filled sky.

A floating boardwalk into a city wetland ten minutes from downtown, where the turtles are sunning and the eagles are showing off.

A one-acre jewel-box garden built by a prince and princess after decades of war and internment and love against the odds.

Victoria's Lieutenant Governor opens 36 acres of roses, Garry oak meadows and an Olympic Mountains view to the public. Free.

A tiny chandelier-lit Fisgard Street patisserie of glossy macarons and cream-filled Paris-Brest that sells out before you have decided.

Canada's narrowest street, three feet wide at points, once a gambling den, now vintage records and ice cream.

Downtown Victoria's 4.8-rated Korean fried chicken spot, where the cheese-pull corn dogs are both a snack and a mild competitive event.

A mountain of fluffy snow-ice in Saanich built for two spoons, one disagreement about toppings and a lot of awkward photo attempts.

The Estevan Village bakery counter two minutes above Willows Beach, known for a breakfast sandwich built on a house biscuit.

Canada's largest used bookstore, three floors and roughly a million books, best navigated with a five-dollar scavenger hunt and no agenda.

A wobbly candy-coloured village of floating homes, harbour seals, and fish and chips on the dock.

An easy, gorgeous walk beside Butchart Gardens: a shaded descent through big cedars to the calm shore of Tod Inlet.

Downtown Victoria's modern hawker-stall with pineapple fried rice, butter chicken and cold beer: the happy, low-stakes weeknight date.

A flat paved shoreline path from the West Bay marina toward downtown, with float planes overhead and otters on the rocks.

Yunnan-province home cooking on Fisgard: handmade dumplings, rich beef noodle bowls and food that punches above its price tag.

Sidney's flat seaside walk past bronze sculptures and loafing seals, with the Gulf Islands and Mount Baker for a backdrop.

A flat, shaded 2.6 km through big cedar to a sheltered saltwater lagoon with benches right at the water, behind Butchart Gardens.

Old-growth firs, a waterfall, a trestle, and in late autumn the river runs red with salmon while eagles watch from above.

A free 6.5-acre rhododendron garden on the UVic campus, where the most expensive thing is a couple of dollars for parking.

The Parliament Buildings lit up and reflected in the harbour: Victoria going all out at the holidays for free.

Pale sand, shallow water, Mount Baker across the strait, and a volunteer-run 1950s soft-serve hut nearby for when you've earned it.

A Heritage Grove of Douglas fir around five centuries old, reached on a flat boardwalk that a wheelchair or a stroller can manage.

A downtown Victoria Vietnamese bistro where fragrant pho, fresh salad rolls, and the hoisin-vs-sriracha debate become the whole date.

A sheltered sandy bay with a climbable concrete sea monster, a zip line, and views to the Olympics. Free and childproof.

The breakwater dares you to walk 800 metres straight into the ocean, and there is absolutely nothing stopping you.

Short, steep and just sketchy enough at the top that you'll naturally steady each other on the slabby rock.

A sheltered crescent cove, views to the Olympic Mountains, and the smug pleasure of a beach most visitors never find. Free.

An easy lakeside walk on the Ed Nixon Trail, with a floating boardwalk out over Langford Lake and benches for the view.

A warm little swimming lake with a sand beach 200 metres from the car, wrapped in a 3.9 km forest loop with water views most of the way.

The Galloping Goose Trail, a long wooden trestle over the Gorge Waterway, and golden hour doing exactly what it should.

A plain little counter in Esquimalt Plaza whose jam donuts and thick Scottish shortbread people cross town for.

Victoria's Saturday farmers' market in Fairfield, with a busker, a market dog, and the constant internal debate about the jam.

The Fort Street bakery's Uptown counter, putting proper French pastry and real espresso in the middle of Saanich.

A 5.3 km loop through 300-year-old Douglas fir and a Garry oak meadow to Pickles Bluff, looking over farmland to Haro Strait.

Quadra Village's Korean fried chicken house since 2017, where the soy-garlic versus yangnyeom debate will outlast dinner.

Stand a foot away from an actual Emily Carr for free, then quietly reconsider your salary when you see the price tags.

A 1.2 km mossy stroll to a 30-metre waterfall and a sandy beach with the Olympic Mountains thrown in.

A 90-minute guided walk through Canada's oldest Chinatown, with earpieces, a local guide, and gambling dens you never knew existed.

A secret spiral staircase, a rocky cove almost nobody else shows up to, and all the driftwood logs you need.

Paddle the glassy freshwater lake where Canada's national rowers train, then reward yourselves at Hamsterly Beach with a swim and a snack.

Victoria is famously mild in winter, except when it isn't. Dallas Road in a storm is something else entirely.

85 trails and 46 km of singletrack on Mount Work, from gentle green runs to double-black drops, twenty minutes out.

The Parliament Buildings light up, a unicyclist might be there, and it costs nothing to watch Victoria show off.

The lesser-known flat rail trail where you can talk the whole way, ending at Sidney's bookshops and waterfront patios as your reward.

Langford's warm swimming lake, with a lifeguarded beach, a long dock and picnic tables under old willows, minutes off Goldstream Avenue.

One of Canada's largest university art collections, free to walk through, in a calm room on Yates Street.

Victoria's best postcard view of downtown, from the wrong side of the harbour, at the exact right time of day.

A few dollars, skate rentals, and a built-in excuse to wobble into each other, right in downtown Victoria.

A wide Central Saanich beach where low tide uncovers enormous sand flats, with James Island offshore and Mount Baker on the horizon.

UVic's repertory cinema since 1971, cheap tickets, locally famous popcorn, and films the multiplex wouldn't touch with a pole.

Friendly drop-in skating at Oak Bay Rec, with skate rentals, low stakes, and Oak Bay Village two minutes away for the after.

Canada's oldest Chinatown, a freshly restored 12-metre dragon gate glowing at dusk, and stone lions from Suzhou. Worth every cent of zero.

Rated one of North America's best British antique strips, and it costs nothing to lose an afternoon in it.

Free entry, experimental art, and a real shot at encountering something you've never seen before, up a Fort Street staircase since 1972.

Oak Bay's grown-up art dealer since 1974, free to browse, and an excellent excuse to develop opinions about things you cannot afford.

A tiny seaside village wharf, the glassy calm of Saanich Inlet, and a 25-minute ferry you do nothing but watch. Free.

A tunnel-like entrance on Broughton Street opens into a five-storey atrium with a mosaic-glass ceiling, and it costs nothing to stay.

Seventy-plus shops, a Purdys Chocolatier, and a food terrace with skyline views to wait out the rain in downtown style.